999 Reading Challenge Review and Discussion Tread

[Night (Travis) Nurse]

I should not have waited to re-read this.

The Winter Men
I don't quite know how to talk about this series because it is PERFECTION. Jean Paul Leon(one of the most underrated artists in the industry) doing the BEST work of his career, Brett Lewis writing snappy dialogue that is funny, heartfelt, distinct and not overly quippy or quick. An atheistic that is rarely explored with Superheroes, a culture rarely explored in Superheroes, action, intrigue, twists, laughs, EVERYTHING.

This comic took the gauntlet thrown down by Watchmen and told a story that exists distinctly Post-Watchmen. This is the best Superhero comic of the past 20 years, if you have not read it because it is mid-late WildStorm it is not quite the easiest thing to track down but READ THIS BOOK.

Never heard of it. Going to have to pick that one up.

Travis

[Night (Travis) Nurse]

Bean World Vol. 1

Somewhere years ago when I was a kid I read a few tales from Bean World and I have no idea wear I read them. I didn't even know there was Bean World until I heard Vince talk about it a long time ago. Having picked up the first 3 volumes from Larry himself at last years Stumptown I got around to reading Vol. 1. Charming Charming Charming. The characters Larry created quickly become endearing and the entire universe is fascinating and something to behold. I loved it and cant wait to read the rest. Also, I left it in my car one day and my son started reading it. He became very curious and excited and hasn't put it down.

Travis

[RickV]

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
I put it on my list as part of that category forgetting that the new one comes out in a week or so. Oh well I will addendum that later or something.

This is a book that perfectly outlines the synthesis nature of comics with multiple creators. When this is Moore & O'Neill it is some of the best adventure comics you can buy. They do the best adaption of John Carter, they do the perfect rendition of Edward Hyde (that guy is just such a perfect comic character) and all the character feel distinct in this very lived in world.

Where this one looses me is when the comic falls away and it becomes spot illustrations + prose story. I get what they are doing and some of them work (the one in Volume 1 especially), but the connect the dots level of geography lessons of the fictional world is just meaningless to me and isn't why I read LoEG, Castle in the Sky and Mononoke references are cute but they are just small side things and don't really play into the comic at large. The later volumes do get better than 2 was with that Almanac but still some of descends into that stuff I really don't want to read. (In a way that the text pieces in say Watchmen never did it is strange, maybe it is because these are referential).

That doesn't take away from my enjoyment of the comics or anticipation for the finale (I saw some crazy theory a while ago that Omar from the Wire would save the world in this and I kinda hope that happens).

Oh and whoever designed those 3D glasses clearly doesn't also wear glasses / reading glasses. Pain in the ass those are.

[jonny the homicidal drummer]

Bandthology- I've never been in a band. I can't carry a tune, to the point where it drives my children nuts when I do sing. Dogs howl. None of that prevented me from enjoying this book. As much as I enjoyed the EOC anthology, I felt that this one was better. It stayed focused on the general music/band theme but each story went in it's own direction, touched on different experiences and thoughts. I should probably have the book in front of me to do this, but I have to mention some of the stories that really stood out to me. There was an incredibly interesting one about the "monster" that gets inside musicians. It did not go where I thought it might and left me with a smile because I think the same thing about creating comics. In another story a band decides to kill their singer so they can become famous. I won't spoil the story, but if I recall the outcome correctly I think John should change his forum name to Mr. One-Eye. There wasn't a single bad story in the bunch and I don't want to slight any of the contributors, it's just that those two stories stuck with me.
The most amazing thing to me was that every one of the people in the anthology did a great job telling their stories. So they not only have enough talent musically to be able to perform in a band - many of them probably creating and performing their own music, but they are talented writers, artists, and storytellers. And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little jealous.

 

[Night (Travis) Nurse]

Finished Chew Volume 4. This title continues to be fun and exciting. I love the art style and the story has a nice pace to it. Its one of those books that when its all finished I plan on reading from the first again.

Travis

[S. Earl]

Recently plowed through the back half of Northlanders. Really enjoyed them, more so then I did the first time around. Siege of Paris stuck out as a high water mark. The art on that arc reminded me of a something you might find in Prophet or Orc Stain mixed with P Craig Russel.

Gotta read the The Icelandic Trilogy and that will close the book on Northlanders. 50 issues of quality comics.

[evaD]

Finn. Interesting. It's a prose novel about Huckleberry Finn's father. The guy who wrote it obviously did his research and came up with some unique ideas. Huck's father was a brutal, mean, bigoted man. It made for a kind of sad read read. Well worth the time though. Warning: no happy ending in sight.

[DoctorTeeth]

I have been sloooowly savouring the Essential Howard The Duck and it is a damn shame that the Omnibus is out of print because as beautiful as the art is, it would be so much better with colour. I do admit that the story post-The Island of Dr. Bong has been less exciting and amazing than the previous 18 or so issues, but to have that many issues that were consistently blowing my mind is pretty hard to top. Love this book.

[RickV]

Finally got that final trade and relived the great and the frustrating that is,

Planetary
So I will start with the great because there is a lot of great here. The covers are distinctive, informative and especially for the time unlike everything else around them. John Cassaday is doing the work of his career and Laura Martin's coloring is flawless. When the book is allowed to just be cool adventures within specific genres it works so well, issue 3 with the Betrayed cop in Hong Kong, the John Stone stuff, and some of the other individual pieces are great.

The problems I have with it are where the mechanics of the story either paint strange pictures, loose stakes or are flawed. The meta-commentary is a very mixed and unclear message that never coalesces into something meaningful, and there is a very strong message that the only people who really matter are those that are born better and anyone else who tries to work higher than their station in life gets punished by the world, it tries to make tenuous connection to the WildStorm Universe at the start and then drops that 3/4ths through, also it should have ended with #26 and them sailing off to find answers. When #27 opens and they have basically turned on god mode money and finances it kinda robs the whole thing of anything, then it goes into the time travel info dump that I guess is cool if it hadn't been read all over the place before it.

I guess I should watch for ending spoilers

At the end when all the time portals open and every group that comes through is Elijah, it seems like he is still keeping the really secretive stuff from the masses, his breadcrumbs may be loaves but they are not the full meal. The mechanics of that scene is kinda funny when you think about it, I mean do they all set their calenders to go back every year on the anniversary of the time they save Ambrose, does anyone else find that weird?

The publication schedule also did not help it much. and a lot of the comic market things it was talking about in 1999 no longer apply when it even gets half through. The thing about the book is I know a lot of those issues are the biggest nitpicks but they do pull me out of the story, which is really good when it is working making the whole thing even more frustrating.

[whirlwindx]

34-37!

Pistol Whip
This is the earlier Matt Kindt stuff I've read with him doing the art and Jason Hall doing the writing. It's black & white so maybe that helps me think of Kindt's stuff as more cartoony and in a stripped down style like Andi Watson or Darwyn Cooke all wrapped around some enjoyable crime stories.

At first I thought these were just separate stories based around the idea of crime. Then one story ended abruptly. With the next I started noticing familiar characters in action or in the background and realized these were just chapters. I don't know if I was just slow but that improved how I looked at the stories later as it all starts connecting and something you see in the first or second story comes up again later on.

Blackest Night: Green Lantern
Blackest Night: Green Latern Corps
Blackest Night

Enjoyed reading Blackest Night even though it suffers a bit from 100 characters being on a page. A few fillers here and there an interesting series that I didn't expect to dig way back into some continuity and certainly sets somethings up. I originally was going to read another volume with it but after one tie-ins issue it became too daunting as other trades were calling to me. It was bogging me down all week so I just marathon-ed 15 issues in a row this weekend. I'll come back to a few tie-ins later on. Relived to be done and up to date on Blackest Night but also looking forward the Brightest Day trade that I bought in the last week.

[RickV]

Is That All There Is?
The complete collected comics of Joost Swarte. Not a lot to say about this. Herge's style just vulgar, violent and so fucking funny. The cartooning is great and some of the tricks he uses are great, there is a two page story that is 1 page that you flip 180 degrees and are even prompted to by the story elegantly it is great.

[Jeppe]

Is That All There Is?
The complete collected comics of Joost Swarte. Not a lot to say about this. Herge's style just vulgar, violent and so fucking funny. The cartooning is great and some of the tricks he uses are great, there is a two page story that is 1 page that you flip 180 degrees and are even prompted to by the story elegantly it is great.

Agreed. Swarte is a real genius when it comes to innovative use of sequential art. I'd warmly recommend this book to just about anyone interested in the medium 

[Night (Travis) Nurse]

Its been a slow going few weeks but I was able to read Empowered Vol. 5 and Revolver over this last week.

Revolver by Matt Kindt: Another unique story by Kindt with great presentation, art and style. A man living in two worlds must come to terms with his life and make an important decision. Matts books are very introspective with reflection on the human condition and I like them for that. I love books about people growing and changing. He blends that with a unique plot and always makes great stuff. One of my favorite things about the book was how he differentiated the two time lines. slightly different two tone coloring but the "news ticker" on the bottom of the page. Whatever story was on the news ticker would contain the page number and for things in the good reality the news was sunny and happy and things in the "nightmare" reality were hard and cold. Nothing amazing but that little something extra that makes Kindt so cool.

Empowered By Adam Warren: As most people know I love Warren and I love the Empowered books. They continue to be fun and get deeper and deeper with each volume. Emp continues to be a wonderfully rich character with a well flushed out supporting cast. More goodness.

Travis

[Ryan 'gobo' C.]

Empowered By Adam Warren: As most people know I love Warren and I love the Empowered books. They continue to be fun and get deeper and deeper with each volume. Emp continues to be a wonderfully rich character with a well flushed out supporting cast. More goodness.

Great book, I picked up a bunch of these during a Dark Horse digital sale and have been working through it. They just keep getting better.

[RickV]

I have to start this with a negative to give this reference, I never understood what people enjoyed about Gotham Central. It to me always felt pedestrian and that it was limiting itself by approach in a way that hurt the comic. Then I read the comic I am going to talk about further cemented this by doing superhero procedural to a level that is unreachable by anything else.

Top 10
The most consistent 12 issues of comics. The perfect blend of science fiction / fantasy tropes and stories with a living breathing police department in a city that is beyond belief. Moore has only achieved characterization like this in V For Vendetta and not since, on top of that dealing with so many distinct people and with the limited space to do all that it is unreal (Even two issues for Joe Pi). The best elements of all your favorite cop shows comes through in every aspect the routine, the banter, the attitude. Overflowing with heart, incredibly funny constantly and great action. Gene Ha, Zander Cannon and Todd Klein deliver the best work of all their careers in creating a world that feels down to earth enough to feel lived in but high enough in the sky to support the characters in it.

That isn't even talking about the background detail, you could spend a good chunk of a year trying to record all the reference and all the detail crammed into every single panel, yet it never suffocates the characters.

Comics this excellent are the rarest of treasures.

[Farrell]

I have to start this with a negative to give this reference, I never understood what people enjoyed about Gotham Central. It to me always felt pedestrian and that it was limiting itself by approach in a way that hurt the comic. Then I read the comic I am going to talk about further cemented this by doing superhero procedural to a level that is unreachable by anything else.

Top 10
The most consistent 12 issues of comics. The perfect blend of science fiction / fantasy tropes and stories with a living breathing police department in a city that is beyond belief. Moore has only achieved characterization like this in V For Vendetta and not since, on top of that dealing with so many distinct people and with the limited space to do all that it is unreal (Even two issues for Joe Pi). The best elements of all your favorite cop shows comes through in every aspect the routine, the banter, the attitude. Overflowing with heart, incredibly funny constantly and great action. Gene Ha, Zander Cannon and Todd Klein deliver the best work of all their careers in creating a world that feels down to earth enough to feel lived in but high enough in the sky to support the characters in it.

That isn't even talking about the background detail, you could spend a good chunk of a year trying to record all the reference and all the detail crammed into every single panel, yet it never suffocates the characters.

Comics this excellent are the rarest of treasures.

The whole point of Gotham Central was to do a straightforward cop procedural drama with the backdrop of the DC, and look at how ordinary people/cops would deal with extraordinary circumstances.  As soon as you had Officer Coldblast running around, it would have thrown that premise out and turned it into a completely different book.  If you LIKE police procedurals in the first place, GC is a pretty good one.

Top Ten was pretty good, too.  If you haven't read the Smax miniseries yet, you might like that too, though it is quite different in scope and tone.

[Rustyautoparts (Russ Otto)]

I'd fallen a bit behind last month. Time to kick it into high gear this month.

Great book, I picked up a bunch of these during a Dark Horse digital sale and have been working through it. They just keep getting better.

How fortuitous. I just read Emp vol. 4 the other night. I think it's where the book really hits its stride. Great book indeed.

[Jeppe]

The whole point of Gotham Central was to do a straightforward cop procedural drama with the backdrop of the DC, and look at how ordinary people/cops would deal with extraordinary circumstances.  As soon as you had Officer Coldblast running around, it would have thrown that premise out and turned it into a completely different book.  If you LIKE police procedurals in the first place, GC is a pretty good one.

Agreed. I'd even go so far as to say that Gotham Central was one of the very best titles coming out of DC proper in the 2000s.

[Ryan 'gobo' C.]

I'd fallen a bit behind last month. Time to kick it into high gear this month.

How fortuitous. I just read Emp vol. 4 the other night. I think it's where the book really hits its stride. Great book indeed.

Yeah I just finished vol 6, and saw vol 7 is $10, not actually that much but I got all the rest on sale so I'm hesitant to pick it up

[Night (Travis) Nurse]

I knew it was bound to happen sooner or later but I finally found something Rick Remender did that I didnt groove on. Gigantic by Rick Remender and Eric Nguyen. Maybe its because the whole reality TV angle has been written to death that this had no flavor for me. Maybe because it was to much crammed into 5 issues that I felt there were a lot of plot holes and character moments that may have had more significance with more time to develop the characters but the whole thing fell flat for me. If anything the saving grace for this was Nguyen, who I haven't cared for all that much but drawing large mechs and robots is where he shines. The covers for these 5 issues are golden and the action scenes are fantastic. There, of course is the gratuitous Godzilla reference with the people of Japan running in fear and his Gigantics refereed name, Giant-Hero-mecha-robot or something like that but it feels plays out. Still love Remender but this was a no for me.

2/5

Travis